1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an image processing apparatus, and more particularly, to processing of print designation information about image data.
2. Description of the Related Art
Conventionally, digital cameras have been known which record an image signal as digital data on a memory card. In recent years, the number of pixels of an imaging sensor has increased to several million pixels, and as a result, higher quality images are now even more easily obtained as compared to previous conventional digital cameras. In addition to viewing the images recorded by the digital camera on a PC or a television screen, the recorded images are often viewed in a printed form.
In order to print the images captured by the digital camera, there are several methods, for example, transferring the image data to the PC to print it by a printer, directly connecting the camera to the printer, or bringing recording media such as a memory card to a printing service to print it there etc. When the image is printed by directly connecting the camera to the printer or by bringing recording media such as a memory card to printing service, it is possible to simplify the printing operation by recording a file in the recording media which designates images to print in advance. As the print designation information, the DPOF (Digital Print Order Format) is known. Making a print using the print designation information is discussed in, for example, Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2002-320173.
Further, in recent years, instead of the memory card, video cameras which record the captured image data on an optical disk such as a DVD (Digital Versatile Disc) have come to the market. With respect to types of the DVD, in addition to a rewritable DVD such as a DVD-RAM or a DVD-RW, a write-once disk such as a DVD-R is used.
In the case of the rewritable disk, it is possible to freely rewrite recorded data. However, in the case of the write-once disk, once the data is recorded, it is not possible to rewrite the data on the disk. Further, if a finalization process (termination process) is performed to make the disk compatible with other types of devices, the disk becomes a playback-only disk, and it is not possible to record data on the disk anymore.
Accordingly, in a video camera which uses the write-once media, after the finalization process is executed, it is not possible to write the print designation information. Therefore, the print designation information cannot be used in printing.
Hence, it would be beneficial to provide video camera or the like which is able to perform print setting of image data which is recorded on a recording medium that cannot record data any more.